I was a little shocked to hear the word CUI pronounced KOI in one of the lessons presented by Chris Milner at the LATINUM podcast. Is that correct?

In general, I think that gentleman's project is very praiseworthy but I do wonder about a few aspects of his pronunciation: coenam sounds like cenam and caelum sounds like coelum. Is this correct?

Just how is the dipthong ae to be pronounced? The nuntii latini folks say it (to my ear) so the latin word quae sounds like the Spanish word que whereas I would have thought that KWAI would be correct. What do you latinists think? I am here to be educated.

Nuntii Latini uses a rather unattractive pronunciation that is somewhat traditional to the Finns. Not to be imitated anymore than a New Zealander accent should be imitated by an Italian speaking English (though I do find New Zealander English attractive).

As for Mr. Milner â€” who does post here on Textkit on occasion â€” his efforts and passion deserve the most lauding, and I mean that with great sincerity. His pronunciation improves over the course of the podcast (I've never listened to all of it or even a lot of it). At first he has a strong English accent, but this fades with time. As for ae sounding like oe â€” that's probably because the text he's reading from spells it cÅ“lum, rather than cÃ¦lum, rather than caelum. A common printing error followed by the pronunciation error.

As for Mr. Milner â€” who does post here on Textkit on occasion â€” his efforts and passion deserve the most lauding, and I mean that with great sincerity.

I agree with you very much on that point. Millner is doing what no one else has ventured to do. I particularly like his is selection of a text, the Adler text. If Evan completes those lessons it will be quite an achievement.

As for ae sounding like oe â€” that's probably because the text he's reading from spells it cÅ“lum, rather than cÃ¦lum, rather than caelum. A common printing error followed by the pronunciation error.

On that point I think you are probably mistaken. In one lesson, called "Swallowing the Dictionary" he says coelum in its place with the other words beginning "co". To me it sounds like "caelum". Perhaps the very fact that we have both "coelum" and "caelum" points to the fact that this represents some sort of received pronunciation. I don't know.

I repeat, I praise Mr. Millner's efforts to the skies. A while back there was a big discussion here about the best way to acquire vocabulary. Well, just by listening to "swallow the dictionary", podcast 4 or five times while commuting to work I have added hundreds of words to my active vocabulary. I absolutely believe in the theory he is using, am actively using a number of his lessons in my own studies, and sincerely hope that he continues with this project for a long time to come.

Mr Millner, if you are reading this, please accept my heartfelt gratitude for your efforts to further latinity. And please do not take my questions regarding pronunciation as a criticism of the overall worthiness of your endeavors.

Kyneto Valesio wrote:On that point I think you are probably mistaken. In one lesson, called "Swallowing the Dictionary" he says coelum in its place with the other words beginning "co". To me it sounds like "caelum". Perhaps the very fact that we have both "coelum" and "caelum" points to the fact that this represents some sort of received pronunciation. I don't know.

What the devil are you talking about, my friend?

Right, he is reading COELUM, which is a mispelling of CAELUM. The reason this mispelling occurred is that most Mediaeval Latin made AE and OE sound like E.

Are you saying that he's pronouncing CAElum as in "kite" after all, and therefore correctly?

I have also been intensively listening to the Latinum podcast. The only pronunciation which I found odd was this one too, which wasn't realated to caelum/coelum in anyway: I am talking about the dative of qui (don't remember the exact contexts, but it probably was "Cui est liber?", or a related sentence). Is this intentional, or a mistake? If it is intentional, does anyone know if there is a rationale behind it?

I have also been intensively listening to the Latinum podcast. The only pronunciation which I found odd was this one too, which wasn't realated to caelum/coelum in anyway: I am talking about the dative of qui (don't remember the exact contexts, but it probably was "Cui est liber?", or a related sentence). Is this intentional, or a mistake? If it is intentional, does anyone know if there is a rationale behind it?

I also noted Millner's odd pronunciation of the word CUI and have asked about it at the Grex Latine Loquentium with a cc to Millner himself. I have just started using the lessons and spent sometime with "Swallowing the Dictionary, Parts 1 and 2", the Coleridge poems, and most recently with lesson 10 of the adler lessons, which is on pronouns. It is there that magister Millner seems to pronounce the word CUI as if he were speaking of the ornamental carp so beloved by the Japanese; in other words what I hear is KOI or even KOI-i

Regarding the dipthongs oe and ae, as he says them (as I recall from MY listening of "Swallowing the Dictionary, Part 1) they sound the same to me. One example that sticks in my mind is coenum (mud) or cenam (dinner)? Does anyone know whether there is a historical basis for this?

As for AE alone, the Nuntii people seem pronounce it as the vowel sound in "hey" whereas I seem to recall (it has been awhile) many books advocate pronouncing it as in AISLE. Latin sans Peine also seems to favor the former. What I am wondering is how people here pronounce it? I am very interested in this and no one has directly addressed how she/he pronounces AE.

Bennett is just pronouncing after the English model "cui" pronounced as in the English "quick" (or "qwik"). When he says "may" be pronounced, he is recommending it to English speakers. The evidence against Bennett's way of pronouncing as "un-classical" is summarised by Sturtevant (1940, Pronunciation of Greek and Latin) who argues (as many others have done before) that the "ui" in "cui", "cuius", "huius", "alicui" (and, interestingly, in "fluitat", "fluitant") is a diphthong. This is what Lucus is arguing (as I understand it). As a diphong, both letters are sounded (and hearable) within one syllable. Erasmus discusses this, also, in De Recta Pronuntiatione. The evidence that the "u" isn't a consonantal "u" (or "w" sound) is better described by Sturtevant, who points out how, historically, those words can also operate as disyllables. This dovetails with what you are saying, Metrodorus (Evan) on cuius...cuiius...quoiius, but by being more adamant that, classically, "cui" was not pronounced "qwi".

Totally disagree with you, Luce, about the Nuntii Latini accent. For me, it definitely is to be emulated (apart from "qui" = "qvi"). Just because I detect Finnish twangs, doesn't mean those speakers don't give great expression and care to vowel lengths, accenting, and other examples in the Erasmian, late-Modern, best-practice model.

Luce care. You're describing how differently they speak compared to a classical Roman. However, I like that they pronounce in a manner that was general in Europe for the last fifteen hundred years as regards:
ph = f
ae = e
oe = e.
And I love the clarity of:
final -m distinct
no vowel elision.
Personally, I would find it hard to imitate what glottal stops between vowels there are and don't seek to. I think insistence on vowel elision is a pretension that should be left to those who have complete fluency and who insist that their listeners must have a total fluency, too. It facilitates speed of delivery but the danger of elision in the mouth of a learner like me is to encourage muddy delivery. Clarity should come before speed. And clarity presumes the hearer's ability, also. In the current state of spoken Latin, you can seldom assume that fluency and the ear's easy ability to disambiguate. You have a spoken fluency, perhaps, that a tiny minority of others have.
To my ear, Nuntii announcers don't sound particularly artificial at all, just particularly careful and clear for the broadcast medium. I appeal to a sense of fair play ("fair say") and that one respects differences in practice. Modern-day English speakers aren't in "error" because they don't pronounce as Shakespeare did. I just find the Nuntii model particularly fine for practical and historical reasons, and say the same about ecclesiastical Latin (which is different and fine, again, although I prefer the Nuntii model).

As for myself, I think I will try to split some of differences between the classical and the various received traditions of pronunciation.

ae - as in aisle
oe - as in boy
cui - as in kwee
ph - as in Fred
final m - with slight nasalization because it sounds cool

As for elision, I won't attempt it for now: too hard!!

What about the combination UE? I understand that the letters are to be sounded distintly (inform me if I err). I find however as I read aloud, which I am doing a lot of, I seem to want to create a single sound with a w sound. Example

tenuerim

Sometimes I pronounce like ten-U-e-rim; at other times as if i where saying ten-WER-im . Ille quattor syllabas habet, hoc tres.

You would be ill advised to go mixing pronunciations, and should best understand the pronunciation at the height of the Classical period â€” this includes knowing Greek pronunciation as well in that period (as easy matter). Understanding this intuitively will give you every advantange and luxury in choosing a pronunciation that came later.

Why is this so important? Because it is critical to comprehending etymology. If PH is reduced to F, then the whole of antiquity is misunderstood, and the same for TH and CH. You should know, Adriane, that the Ancient Romans made clear the importance of nasalized final -m and its elision just as a vowel. If you spoke Italian with no elision, you'd sound downright awkward. Not only are these natural aspects of the language, they are essential.

One you have mastered these skills, then move foreward to other times. The times that came later, and the language and litterature themselves, can only make sense if you understand their origins.

The analogy to Shakespearean English is rather specious. You, good sir, being an Irishman, speak in an accent nearly identical to that of Shakespeare's times in England. Nor can the excedingly mild divergence from Shakespearean to Modern British or American be compared to the complete structural divolution of the mispronunciation of final -m or the loss of all elision or all aspiration.

I agree on this, Luce, that understanding Classical literature is deepened by understanding (or trying to understand) pronunciation. But then understanding the literature of the next fifteen hundred years requires an understanding of alternate accent(s). If you spoke Latin c.-100 to +100 to Latin speakers after AD 500, say, "you'd sound downright awkward", too. It's all relative.

Also, I, an Irishman, speak with an unusual accent (as I've been told many times by people here) and yet I am an Irishman. And did Shakespeare (coming from near Birmingham) speak with an Ulster, Munster, Connaught or Leinster accent? Because they are quite different. The fact that some have written that Shakespeare spoke in a way that, in some respects, sounds closer to certain contemporary Irish dialects than some contemporary English dialects doesn't mean Shakespeare spoke in "an accent nearly identical" to an Irishman. His contemporaries might have noticed that and said something about it, surely. (That's not totally facetious, by the way, because it draws attention to the question "did Tudor English people sound like Irish people" and to the answer "surely not".) Have a listen to the recording (not that it's definitive but it's a serious experiment) of "The real sound of Shakespeare?"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4694993.stmand say that sounds like any contemporary Irishman. Some sounds have an echo but generally you have to say, "not really". There are some Irish accents speaking English and I guarantee you would not be able to understand a word of them. My wife is from the West of Ireland and has great difficulty understanding the way some of my friends in Belfast talk and Belfast is only 190 miles from Galway. My point is that, if you imagine a notional standard (such as Shakespearean English), you soon discover that not only does it change in time, but at any one time there are huge divergences from the norm, and there's no good complaining that people have got it wrong. And the beauty of language and literature is that, to their users and audiences, they don't "only make sense if you understand their origins". These are immersive experiences and language shift is usually imperceptibly slow, so most people (apart from linguists) don't need to concern themselves with origins, and where and how the changes occur.

It is right, generally, to recommend a classical model of pronunciation to someone who is learning Latin and aspiring to an understanding of classical literature (although, personally, the Renaissance is my thing). I love classical Roman models, too, precisely because they can be helpful in understanding classical Romans!! but the academic uncertainties over details in classical Roman accent are significant, too!! I just think you can't tell centuries of people and big bunches of those around today that their Latin accent is "wrong" when they don't sound like a classical Roman (unless they are trying to, of course). Because accent, in conversation at least, isn't set by rule but by conventional practice, and that varies from group to group -- and it even varies within the Reformed classical notional camp. Millions have been beaten around the head in schools for centuries to encourage them to lose their "common" or "country" accents because they are hard to understand when you're not used to them. (It's not that long ago historically that schools stopped beating elision in written and spoken English out of pupils.) Accent differences have always been big. They've also been beautiful. Save the differences.

I'm reminded of Arrius in this discussion. Though I prefer Classical Golden pronunciation, I often do not emulate it exactly, particularly in the laryngealisation (is that the right way to describe what's happening? I'm not sure... I know I've heard it called nasalisation as well, but it seems slightly different than the gamma-gamma of Greek...) of gn, as in magnus. And I only nasalise the final -m if I'm reading poetry. I'm also prone to say benest, or homost. I don't find it hindering if you know what the correct pronunciation is for such and such author. It seems to come down as a personal opinion. I mean, is Lucus Eques really saying that the 5th century Gallic Romani were wrong in how they pronounced their Latin?

I think the main problem in our discussion is a lack of communication between us. You refer, bone Adriane, to the pronunciation I advocate first as an "accent." It is not an accent, but an order of magnitude greater in significance. Naturally I accept and adore the variety in English language accents, and thoroughly enjoy emulating them. We can classify the difference between Shakespearean and modern variants as an accentual divergence.

Elision, on the other hand, is an entire order of structure. It is a fundamental component of the Latin language, and has not only transcended every accent and dialect of ancient, natural Latin, but also has established itself prominently in all the Romance languages and their dialects. This is structural, and essential.

His contemporaries might have noticed that and said something about it, surely.

Maybe then my indication was unclear. (And this is trivial to our discussion, but interesting.) The modern Irish accents (all 30 or so of them) for the most part retain an older pronunciation of English, and most bear a distinct resemblance to Shakespearean. There are similar old traits to be found in Welsh and Scottish English as well.

What is this English elision you speak of? The only example that comes to mind is Elizabethan "in th'afternoon."

I don't think you understand the linguistics behind it, Lucus Eques. What do you think "ain't" is? Or gonna? One of my personal favorites is I'd've. I don't recall anyone using it before me, but it appears that it is now on Wikipedia.

Lucus Eques wrote:What is this English elision you speak of? The only example that comes to mind is Elizabethan "in th'afternoon."

When, in elocution lessons, you learn "correct" English pronunciation, you are taught to enunciate clearly: all the vowels (almost) and all the syllables. In natural speech, a native speaker does not enunciate so clearly but frequently elides (plus other things). The vowel sounds can be dropped altogether or they can be retained but distinctions between them become blurred. And consonants can get dropped and syllables run together. "How do you do?" becomes "How dew do?" Northern Ireland is almost like "Norn Ir'n" in some accents. The careful articulation of "received" pronunciation sounds artificial or "frightfully proper" or even used for comic effect today. Eliza Dolittle couldn't (sorry, "could not") get a presenter's job in the BBC today and Henry Higgins now works as a dialogue coach. (Oh hello, Chris. I hadn't spotted your earlier post. It's --oops, "it is"--as you say.)

Lucus Eques wrote:The modern Irish accents (all 30 or so of them) for the most part retain an older pronunciation of English, and most bear a distinct resemblance to Shakespearean.

You are using too big a brush to paint your picture. Some sounds (depending on where exactly you look and who you are talking about) in contemporary Irish-English show the influence of English, Scottish and Welsh planter settlement on language habits in the 16th-17th centuries, as the population (unwillingly and then inescapably) begins to move from Irish as a first language to English as a first language for the most part. That's significantly different from Irish-English speaking today distinctly resembling Shakespearean English. You would have to say it distinctly resembles many other ways of speaking also, and your point would be lost. Some contemporary Irish-English sounds will be similar to Shakespearean English-English and some will not, otherwise we might be led to expect the discovery of witness that a 16th-century Irish speaker of English sounded distinctly like a Shakespearean English person. To contemporaries it was the differences that were distinctive. Apologies, Luce. Maybe I'm arguing too much, because all I'm objecting to is the exaggeration of the word "distinct".

Chris Weimer wrote:I don't think you understand the linguistics behind it, Lucus Eques. What do you think "ain't" is? Or gonna? One of my personal favorites is I'd've. I don't recall anyone using it before me, but it appears that it is now on Wikipedia.

Lucus Eques wrote:What is this English elision you speak of? The only example that comes to mind is Elizabethan "in th'afternoon."

When, in elocution lessons, you learn "correct" English pronunciation, you are taught to enunciate clearly: all the vowels (almost) and all the syllables. In natural speech, a native speaker does not enunciate so clearly but frequently elides (plus other things). The vowel sounds can be dropped altogether or they can be retained but distinctions between them become blurred. And consonants can get dropped and syllables run together. "How do you do?" becomes "How dew do?" Northern Ireland is almost like "Norn Ir'n" in some accents. The careful articulation of "received" pronunciation sounds artificial or "frightfully proper" or even used for comic effect today. Eliza Dolittle couldn't (sorry, "could not") get a presenter's job in the BBC today and Henry Higgins now works as a dialogue coach. (Oh hello, Chris. I hadn't spotted your earlier post. It's --oops, "it is"--as you say.)

Those also are all contractions. Elisions involve a final vowel blending with an initial vowel. In this way, one could say technically that "County Mayo's very pretty" is a case of elision, though the general classification is that of contraction.

1. The action of dropping out or suppressing: a. a letter or syllable in pronunciation; b. a passage in a book or connecting links in discourse. Also, an instance of either of these. Also fig.

1581 SIDNEY Apol. Poetrie (Arb.) 70 The Italian is so full of Vowels, that it must euer be cumbred with Elisions. 1589 PUTTENHAM Eng. Poesie II. xii[i]. (Arb.) 129 If there were no cause of elision. 1710 STEELE Tatler No. 230. 6 The..Elisions, by which Consonants of most obdurate Sound are joined together. 1836 HOR. SMITH Tin Trump. I. 2 Standard words..are arbitrarily cut off by elision. 1870 BOWEN Logic iii. 57 The science claims, therefore, to fill up the gaps and elisions of ordinary discourse. 1893 in Funk's Stand. Dict. 1936 R. CAMPBELL Mithraic Emblems 20 Seven hues in white elision. 1962 Sunday Times 28 Jan. 12/2 The elision of pay pause into pay restraint has at this stage scarcely been attempted. 1964 M. CRITCHLEY Developmental Dyslexia viii. 52 The process of learning to read entails the elision from the focus of attention of the confusing memory-images of the non-dominant hemisphere. 2. elision of the air: formerly assigned as the cause of sound (see quot.). Obs.

1626 BACON Sylva Â§124 The Cause given of Sound, that it should be an Elision of the Air (whereby, if they mean anything, they mean Cutting or Dividing, or else an Attenuating of the Air) is but a Terme of Ignorance. 1660 BOYLE New Exp. Phys.-Mech. Digress. 346 The Production and Modulation of the Voice by the Elision of the Air. 3. A breaking (so as to make a gap) by mechanical force. (Scarcely a recognised Eng. use.)

1760 tr. Juan & Ulloa, Voyage to S. Amer. (1772) II. 98 The sea formed these large cavities..by its continual elisions. 1881 Times 12 Mar., It [Casamicciola] is now half in ruins, and even those houses which have stood are crippled by elisions.

Even my Mac OSX Thesaurus defines elision as "the omission of a sound or syllable when speaking (as in I'm, let's, e'en)"

I know Wiki distinguishes contraction and elision but that is only to say a contraction is a special type of elision -- an elision that has been morphologized:

The elided form of a word or phrase may become a standard alternative for the full form, if used often enough. In English, this is called a contraction, such as can't from cannot. Contraction differs from elision in that contractions are set forms that have morphologized, but elisions are not.

but I'm going to check my Cambridge English Grammar when I get home to see if linguistic usage maintains any fine distinctions, or is so mad as to say that, when an elision becomes so common it stops being an elision because it is now called a contraction!!!

I DILUTE MY OFFER: If you agree to say that the Nuntii Latini broadcasters aren't in "error", I'll agree to say that I sound a BIT like William Shakespeare. Deal?

I checked the Cambridge English Grammar, but it says nothing about elision. However, have a look at this online resource "Transcribing English Phrases" (2003) by Paul Tench of the Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University at www.cardiff.ac.uk/encap/staff/tench/tra ... hrases.pdfHe defines elision

A second type of simplification involves not an adjustment to a sound, but its complete removal. This is known as elision; the missing sound is said to have been elided.

He includes "don't" and "he's" under the category of elision and he gives the following typical examples (along with loads of others):
Chris(t)mas, Han(d)kerchief, han(d)some, san(d)wich, gran(d)father, Ol(d) Man River, They as(k)ed me, Hist(o)ry, Secret(a)ry, mot(o)ring, myst(e)ry, , Febr(u)ary, technic(al)ly, eas(i)ly, choc(o)late, fam(i)ly, op(e)ning, matter o(f) fact, brother (i)n law, mother (a)n(d) toddlers, f(o)r instance, f(o)r a minute, c(or)rect, c(ol)lect, p(e)rhaps, s(up)pose
I understand now that you don't count these as elision because that's not what elision means regarding Latin poetry, but you did ask what I meant about elision in English.
OFFER STILL STANDS: If you agree to say that the Nuntii Latini broadcasters aren't in "error", I'll agree to say that I sound a BIT like William Shakespeare. Deal?

Last edited by adrianus on Wed Nov 28, 2007 6:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

In any case, I will concur with you, for the etymology of "elision" doesn't refer specifically to vowels either. But speaking Latinly, we understand elision to refer to vowel junctions, while Latin contractions occur within words (e.g. jurasti, dixsti, cunctaris < cunctaveris, etc.).

I believe ÏƒÏ…Î½Î±Î»Î¿Î¹Ï†á½µ â€” "blending" â€” is the correct Greek term for vowel on vowel elision.

And I contend with thousands of years of linguistic evidence and half a dozen daughter languages that this is structural and fundamental â€” not mere frills to be jettisoned.

Qui se decipit alium reprehendit et veniam detinet! Semper sic.
I DILUTE MY OFFER AGAIN: Unless you agree to say that the Nuntii Latini broadcasters aren't in "error", I will put it about that not even William Shakespeare sounds like William Shakespeare. Deal?

Could the distinction between "elision" and "contraction" be one of historical timing? Elision is a natural process that's happened in every natural language since time immemorial; but in the 17th and 18th Centuries, Language Academies started being established, and Samuel Johnson started pontificating on hoe English "should" be. Could "elision" be elision that took place before that time, and "contraction" be elision that took place afterwards and that you could still get some extreme purists to call "substandard?"

Historical, Arvid, you're more than likely right that, because of national academic pressures to standardize on spelling, some elisions (such as t' o') become wholly acceptable in writing, particularly because of the importance in scanning poetry in English. But I don't think you need say that's a cut-off date between elision and contraction. The apostrophe or high comma (') indicated an elision in English even before the 17th century, I believe. (Must check this.) The Wiki distinction is a little silly in suggesting a contraction is not an elision, but at heart signals a fair usage: a contraction is a morphologized elision. In other words, the word "can't" is a single word that insists on a single syllable.

All this talk about correct pronunciation is well and good - I am thoroughly in favour of steadily working on improving one's pronunciation of Latin.

However, we need to remember that there are probably fewer than 1000 people on this planet who are fluent in Latin, and only around 10 000 or so (optimistic assessment)who can carry out a basic conversation on everyday topics. The 1000 regular down loaders of the Latinum podcast therefore represent a significant alteration to this state of affairs.

The focus is to get speaking. Until the revival of what we call Restored Classical, there were a large number of variant pronunciations. Now we have one standardized 'pronunciation', with a fair amount of agreement on how to pronounce most words, but of course regional national accents intrude into it in active use. This is to be expected. Latin has no national accent.

I do agree however, that when attempting to speak restored classical, attention should be given to elision. If you concentrate on getting the vowel lengths right from the start, and the elision, then the texts, when read aloud, will have the rhythms that their authors intended them to have - and Classical texts were all intended to be read aloud. Tacitus sounds great when read aloud while soaking in the bath.

This means a lot of work in the beginning, but if you speak out loud, you will remember the correct vowel quantities of words. The elision will also eventually come naturally, as opposed to being done with conscious effort. Its like directing a carriage with a team of horses. A novice driver won't be able to control all the horses at once, and should not be expected to - but they had better start trying if they ever want to drive a carriage.

However, we need to remember that there are probably fewer than 1000 people on this planet who are fluent in Latin, and only around 10 000 or so (optimistic assessment)who can carry out a basic conversation on everyday topics.

I am among the 10 000. Aspire to be among the 1 000. Ut valeatis quam optime opto ex imo corde.